Apparently "out of government control" does NOT mean "secure."  Benghazi seems to be secure.  Can't find out anything about Tobruk.  Elsewhere continuous reports and tweets of bands of roving mercenaries and die-hard security forces on a murder spree: roaming the city in trucks and cars, sniping, and shooting people for the hell of it.  

1.  The Tarhouna tribe in and around Tripoli have abandoned Gaddafi and joined the demonstrations; much of Libya's army is Tarhouna.

2.  The Nafusa Mountains west and southwest of Tripoli are out of government control; Al Jazeera confirmed.

3.  Police and Army units in Tripoli are joining protesters.

4.  The regime seems to control only a small part of Tripoli, the rest is out of their control.

5.  The attack on the protesters at Green Square last night was a slaughter.  The dead and injured are "uncountable."  

6.  Humanitarian aid, mostly medical supplies, have been dispatched into Libya from Egypt and Tunisia.  

7.  The medical situation is frightful.  Horrific.  Hospitals all across Libya are said to be "overflowing."  Morgues ... ditto.  The total number of protester casualties - dead and wounded - will run well over ten thousand.  Making it even worse, Al Jazeera Arabic reportedly confirming Pro-government forces are killing people at hospitals.  

8.  Protesters are burning police stations, security forces buildings, and Army installations.  

9.  Reports that protesters have seized two satellite TV and an FM radio station.

10.  People from Zawiya, Sabratha and other surrounding towns are now headed to Tripoli.

11.  Protesters in eastern Libya are now "heavily armed" after taking over Army depots and installations.  

12.  500 Libyan army soldiers have been released from a Benghazi prison.  They were arrested for refusing to fire on protesters.

13.  For the No Shit, Sherlock File: journalist says "Libya is on the brink of revolution."  

She believed in nothing; only her skepticism kept her from being an atheist. -- Jean-Paul Sartre

The Libyan ambassador to India has resigned in protest over the massacres.

The Libyan ambassador to China declared this morning that Gadaffi has likely fled the country.

This morning a large crowd is gathering in Sana'a calling for the resignation of president Ali Abdullah Saleh. Over 1,000.

Eyewitness reports of government buildings and a TV station burning in Tripoli.

RT @ShababLibya: BREAKING CONFIRMED: Tarhuna is out in the streets! The army has joined the protesters! Heading to Tripoli now!! #feb17 #gaddaficrimes #libya

He declared that he hoped in the territorial integrity of Libya since an Islamic Emirat of Eastern Libya would be a menace for Europe.

Gadaffi's tribe has apparently abandoned him.

Eastern Libya freed and stable today.

Have the egyptian people not suffered enough?

Any idiot can face a crisis - it's day to day living that wears you out.

of a novel by Gustave Flaubert : Salammbo

Actually it would be more appropriate for the Tunisian revolution, since the action takes place in and around Carthage. But all this talk of civil war, tribes and mercenaries brings it to mind.

After the First Punic War, Carthage is unable to fulfil promises made to its army of mercenaries, and finds itself under attack. The fictional title character, a priestess and the daughter of Hamilcar Barca, an aristocratic Carthaginian general, is the object of the obsessive lust of Matho, a leader of the mercenaries. With the help of the scheming freed slave, Spendius, Matho steals the sacred veil of Carthage, the Zaïmph, prompting Salammbô to enter the mercenaries' camp in an attempt to steal it back. The Zaïmph is an ornate bejewelled veil draped about the statue of the goddess Tanit in the sacrosanct of her temple: the veil is the city's guardian and touching it will bring death to the perpetrator.

A good read, if you like turgid blood-and-thunder epics. I doubt that it has much to tell us about the Libyan revolution, though.

Because of its popular impact in 19th century France, Edward Said would (or should) probably class it as seminal in the creation of that colonialist cultural construct : orientalism.

_{It is rightly acknowledged that people of faith have no monopoly of virtue - Queen Elizabeth II}

A clash in northern Morocco left five dead today, according to the Moroccan government.

The Italian opposition is heavily criticising the Italian government for their privileged relation with Gadaffi and has called for a condemnation of the government violence as Germany just did at noon. The Minister of Foreign Affairs seems more concerned with a surge in clandestine arrivals on Italian coasts. While Gadaffi menaced Europe that he would no longer hold back tide of illegal immigrants, he is no longer in a position to block any prospective flow. Berlusconi has kept silent about his friend's plight. After all his portrait is on some Libyan banknotes.

There were reports this morning that a military base abandoned near Tripoli was attacked by the air force in order to prevent arms falling into the rebellion's hands.

The general impression is of a void of power today in Tripoli, a sort of anarchy, that should resolve itself by the afternoon when a mass prayer demonstration has been called.

rumors that 2000 bangladeshi workers are being held at knifepoint by rebels near benghazi

Any idiot can face a crisis - it's day to day living that wears you out.

IRAN: "URGENT WE NEED YOUR HELP" خبر فوری استفاده از گاز اشک آورهای جدید بر علیه مردم

"Attention all Chemical Engineers"

The Islamic regime in IRAN  is using a new "tear gas" that renders those exposed into a state of semi paralysis and violent sickness. We want to reach out to chemical engineers the world over to help us identify the gas and how to defuse it?

 

Symptoms include:

severe nausea and vomiting (in some cases blood),

semi paralysis,

blurry vision.

supposedly a video of Khadafi fleeing

http://www.20min.ch/ro/news/monde/story/La-video-de-la-fuite-de-Kadhafi--21755948

The Arab leader who handled protests most wisely is King Mohammed of #Morocco. He treated them as a sign of progress.

Egypt's top prosecutor has requested the freezing of the foreign assets of Hosni Mubarak, 10 days after the president stood down amid mass rallies.

Prosecutor General Abdel Magid Mahmud asked the Egyptian foreign minister to contact other nations on the issue.

He said the freeze would apply to Mr Mubarak, his wife, his two sons and two daughters-in-law.

Mr Mubarak is widely thought to have amassed a fortune during his nearly 30-year stay in power.

Many protesters and anti-corruption campaigners have been pressing prosecutors to open an investigation into the Mubarak family's assets, put at anywhere from $1bn to $70bn (£616m - £43bn).

Two jet fighters, believed to be Libyan Air Force Mirage jets, have landed at MIA earlier this afternoon. Shortly before the jet fighters landed, two helicopters touched down at MIA. Maltastar.com was in no position to confirm what was the nature of the visit. Unconfirmed sources claim that Libyan elite were on board the jets and helicopters

The persons who were on board are being held for further investigation.

Initial reports suggested that the èassengers were French nationals working for oil companies who evaquated from Tripoli.

AJE: Reports of huge march in Tripoli, live ammo and aircraft weaponry used against them. NOT CONFIRMED, but horrifying if true. #libya

1636: A senior source in Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez's government denies Libya's Col Gaddafi is coming to Venezuela, Reuters further reports.

Libyan4life Aljazeera Arabic reports that the London Ambassador of #Libya resigns.

AJE: landlines in and out of Libya were just cut. Can anyone confirm????? #libya

If Tony Blair brings much more peace to the Middle East, there will be nobody left alive.

BBC & al-Jazeera are now saying military aircraft are attacking protestors in #Libya.

MILAN (AFP) - Shockwaves from the unrest in Libya on Monday hit its former colonial overlord Italy -- a top foreign investor in Libya and a country in which the North African state has also invested billions.

Libya's sovereign wealth fund and veteran ruler Moamer Kadhafi's family own stakes in Italy's biggest bank UniCredit, defence and industry giant Finmeccanica, as well as in the first-division Juventus football club.

Shares in UniCredit plunged 5.75 percent by close of trading in Milan.

Shhh527 HRW on AJE: Last phone call to Tripoli 2 hrs ago. Can't connect now. #libya

The Libyan delegation to the UN has requested action by the UN against the pending bloodbath. They have called for a no-fly zone over Libya.

1. #Libya deputy ambassador to U.N. says Gadhafi has declared war on Libyan people, is committing genocide. http://on.cnn.com/emQH5v 5 minutes ago via web
2. U.S. State Dept. orders family members of U.S. Embassy employees, non-emergency personnel to leave Libya. http://on.cnn.com/emQH5v

BiancaJagger REMEMBER THIS ARTICLE IN THE DAILY MAIL: Tony Blair our very special adviser by dictator Gaddafi's son http://ow.ly/40gdf

Sit-in in front of parliament against Italy- Libya treaty this evening in Rome.

According to the blogger Hassan Al Jahmi, one of the leaders of the revolt, there is a bloodbath in Tripoli but with the exception of Tripoli and Sirte, Gadaffi's hometown, all of Libya has been liberated.

The Libyan Embassy in London has just seen its flag taken down and replaced by the protesters' flag

The Libyan pilots that landed in Malta have requested political asylum, asserting that they prefered to flee rather than follow orders to fire on demonstrators.

@IanDunt only 69 years ago it was varied provinces not one Libya. But the thought of having 3 or 4 Gafdafis instead of one is not attractive

Adel Darwish (AdelDarwish) on Twitter

Libya's largest tribe (wagafahhah ) has switched side against Gaddafi; if his tribe fights it will be rerun of 1936 tribal war in Libya

Breaking: Sabha tribes are on the move towards Tripoli

Reports that aid convoys that crossed into #Libya from #Egypt has reached Tobruq amid celebrations

YES!

Means the coast road from Egypt/Libyan border is open (89 miles.)  From Tobruk to Benghazi is 278/448 (miles/kilometers) or (about) 6 hours.  

She believed in nothing; only her skepticism kept her from being an atheist. -- Jean-Paul Sartre

Egy army has set up 2 field hospitals on border with Libya, camps to receive Egyptians (and Libyans) & is providing transport to Cairo contd

As if statutory rape, prostitution, & corruption weren't enough, tacit support of Qaddafi makes Berlusconi the West's most vile leader

@Marwabenhalim: The medical supplies convoy, 5 ambulances and 30 doctors has left this evening at 6 o'clock from Cairo

This is VASTLY more important than gearing-up for military intervention.  There are thousands of people requiring medical care and the US 6th Fleet and other naval forces could be deployed to provide it.

She believed in nothing; only her skepticism kept her from being an atheist. -- Jean-Paul Sartre

@marwame: [Al Jazeera Arabic]: Egyptian army declares the borders between Egypt and Libya completely open now

10:40pm: Yusuf Al Qardawi, a leading Sunni cleric, has just issued a fatwa on Al Jazeera Arabic, encouraging the assassination of Gaddafi.

Reuters: Venezuela's foreign min talked to his Libyan counterpart by phone, was told Gaddafi is still in Tripoli. #libya

Cyrenaican Ali Oujali (ambassador to United States) just now announced on AJA that he's against the killing going on in #Libya & is w/ ppl of #Libya

Professor David Held probably knows more about the beliefs of Saif al-Islam Gaddafi, son of the Libyan leader, Muammar Gaddafi, than anyone else in Britain.

For four years, Held was an informal academic adviser to Saif, who has warned in an address on state television that protesters in Tripoli will be eradicated if they continue their unrest.

"Watching Saif give that speech - looking so exhausted, nervous and, frankly, terrible - was the stuff of Shakespeare and of Freud: a young man torn by a struggle between loyalty to his father and his family, and the beliefs he had come to hold for reform, democracy and the rule of law," said Held, author of books such as Restructuring Global Governance and Models of Democracy.

Held was not Saif's tutor during his years at the LSE but the young man frequently sought out the professor for advice on his PhD, which called for greater democracy in global governance.

Effectively without direct confirmable testimony in Libya it is hard to evaluate claims either way today.

Kahled Kaeem, Libyan Deputy FM is denying those planes in Malta are from #Libya b/c they dont have the #Libyan flag on them.......

Does the Express know something about Gaddafi that no one else does, or are those two headlines not connected?

Dozens of students & activists arrested in Zimbabwe for watching #AlJazeera's coverage of uprisings, reports New York Times

Italy FM absolutely rejects in strongest terms online rumours of Italian involvement in #Gaddafi airstrikes on civilians in #Libya

FT: Oil groups prepare to shut down operations in #Libya, price of crude rises

Cer Breaking on Al Jazeera says there are ads in Nigeria and Guinea requesting mercenaries for #Libya for $2000 a day.. #Feb17

@acarvin I am amazed how many people have 'classic' Libyan flags available. Seems many have been waiting for these days.

1. excuseme #LibyanTV, WHAT THE F"@&? I bieleve the police hired those to say that to support Saif's speech, drugged youth protesters he say! 14 minutes ago via Twitter for iPhone
2. The libyan tv showing tunisians & egyptions interviewed by police, they said they r drug dealers hired by outsiders to drug the protesters!!

Lord Owen calling for "airforces in the region with sufficient range to reach Libya to prevent any military action against civilians."

12 Dassault Mirage F1BD/EDMulti role fighter

Down to 10 since the colonels who defected to Malta had them.

Hardpoints: 1 centreline pylon, four underwing and two wingtip pylons with a capacity of 6,300 kg (13,900 lb) (practical maximum load 4,000 kg (8,800 lb)) and provisions to carry combinations of:

    * Rockets: 8× Matra rocket pods with 18× SNEB 68 mm rockets each
    * Bombs: various

40 Su-22M3/UM-3K Ground attack

Up to 4000 kg (8,820 lb) on ten hardpoints (three under the fixed portion of each wing, four on the fuselage sides), including free-fall bombs, rocket pods, cluster bombs, SPPU-22-01 cannon pods with traversable barrels, ECM pods, napalm tanks, and nuclear weapons.

I doubt anyone was dumb enough to give that maniac nukes.

3 Sukhoi Su-24 Long range bomber

# Up to 8,000 kg (17,640 lb) ordnance on 8 hardpoints, including up to 4 × Kh-23  radio-command missiles; up to 4 × Kh-25ML  laser-guided missiles; up to 2 × Kh-28 , Kh-58 , or Kh-31P up to 3 × Kh-29L/T  laser/TV-guided missiles; up to 2 × Kh-59 'Ovod'  TV-command guided missiles, or KAB-500KR TV-guided and KAB-500L laser-guided bombs.  Unguided rocket launchers with 55 mm S-5 rockets, 80 mm S-8 rockets, or 120 mm S-13 rockets.

Other weapon options include general-purpose bombs, external gun pods

40 Soko J-21 Jastreb Light ground attack

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soko_J-21_Jastreb

110 Aero L-39 Light attack/trainer

Puny, but there is a lot of them.  

Up to 284 kg (626 lb) of stores on two external hardpoints

116 Soko G-2 Galeb

Again, puny but a lot.

Hardpoints: 4 with a capacity of 300 kg (660 lb) total

How many of these things are operational is a good question.  Except for the Mirages all these things are Warsaw Pact era weapons.  Countering that: there is a lot of 'em, "quantity has a quality of its own," and the revolutionaries have zero air defense capability.

Even with that, I have a hard time seeing what the point is of having the Libyan Air Force bombing Libyans.  OK, these things fly over a city, drop bombs, and land.  Then what?  Fly over a city, drop more bombs, and land.  Then what?  You can rinse, lather, repeat as long as there is fuel to fly and bombs to drop but there's no military value in this process because it doesn't impose the regime's will on the populace or battlefield, interdict logistics, or degrade the revolutionaries ability to conduct military operations (to dignify what they are doing by that phrase.)

The only thing I can figure is Gadaffi is being a psychopathic asshole, dragging as many Libyans as he can along with him on his path to death.


She believed in nothing; only her skepticism kept her from being an atheist. -- Jean-Paul Sartre

Deep cracks were showing and Gaddafi seemed to be losing vital support, as Libyan government officials at home and abroad resigned, air force pilots defected and major government buildings were targeted during clashes in the capital.

At least 61 people were killed in the capital city on Monday, witnesses told Al Jazeera. The protests appeared to be gathering momentum, with demonstrators saying they have taken control of several important towns and the city of Benghazi, to the east of Tripoli.

....

With reports of large-scale military operations under way in Tripoli, a spokesperson for Ban Ki-moon said the UN chief held extensive discussions with Gaddafi on Monday, condemned the escalating violence in Libya and told him that it "must stop immediately".

UN Council, Arab League to meet

The UN Security Council will hold a closed-door meeting on Tuesday to discuss the crisis in Libya, diplomats said. They said the meeting, known as consultations, had been requested by Libyan deputy ambassador Ibrahim Dabbashi and would start at 1400 GMT. Dabbashi and other diplomats at Libya's mission to the UN on Monday said they sided with protesters in Libya.

Earlier, Hamad Bin Jassim Bin Jabr Al-Thani, Qatar's prime minister and foreign minister, called for an extraordinary meeting of the Arab League to take place on Tuesday. The aim is to discuss the current crisis in Libya and to put additional "pressure" on the government, Al-Thani told Al Jazeera.

CAIRO -- Deep cracks opened in Moammar Gadhafi's regime Monday, with Libyan government officials at home and abroad resigning, air force pilots defecting and a major government building ablaze after clashes in the capital of Tripoli. Protesters called for another night of defiance against the Arab world's longest-serving leader despite a crackdown.

....

The heaviest fighting so far has been in the east. Security forces in Benghazi opened fire on Sunday on protesters storming police stations and government buildings. But in several instances, units of the military turned against them and sided with protesters. By Monday, protesters had claimed control of the city, overrunning its main security headquarters, called the Katiba.

Celebrating protesters raised the flag of the country's old monarchy, toppled in 1969 by a Gadhafi-led military coup, over Benghazi's main courthouse and on tanks around the city.

"Gadhafi needs one more push and he is gone," said Amal Roqaqie, a lawyer at the Benghazi court, saying protesters are "imposing a new reality. ... Tripoli will be our capital. We are imposing a new order and new state, a civil constitutional and with transitional government."

In an update to this article:

Today 4:57 PM   Reports: Libyan Officers Ask Army To Head To Tripoli, Remove Gadhafi

SultanAlQassemi     @ SultanAlQassemi : Breaking Al Jazeera: Statement by Libyan Military Officers asks all members of the Libyan army to head to Tripoli & remove Gaddafi #Libya

A later Sultan Al Qassemi's tweet:

SultanAlQassemi   1. Al Manar Breaking: Political Activists: Three senior generals in the Libyan army have joined the protesters.

If confirmed, Sultan Al Qassemi's tweets could indicate that, within a day or two we may finally have: "NO MORE MOAMMAR!"

"It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."

Cruel. Vainglorious. Steeped in blood. And now, surely, after more than four decades of terror and oppression, on his way out?

A taste:

So even the old, paranoid, crazed fox of Libya - the pallid, infantile, droop-cheeked dictator from Sirte, owner of his own female praetorian guard, author of the preposterous Green Book, who once announced he would ride to a Non-Aligned Movement summit in Belgrade on his white charger - is going to ground.

"Your passports please," said the young man in civilian clothing toting an AK-47 at the Libyan border.

"For what?" responded our driver, Saleh, a burly, bearded man who had picked us up just moments before. "There is no government. What is the point?" He pulled away with a dismissive laugh.

The Libyan army is one of the poorest and most neglected security sector in the government. They are poorly fed , equipped, trained and payed. They are mostly ceremonial and Qaddafi does not trust them. So what we have here are private battalions with each of his sons owning the one named for him. So for example his son Khamees has a battalion belonging to him calling it "Kateebit Khamees." Each is placed in private super huge barracks situated strategically around Tripoli for situations like these. These battalions are well-equipped, trained and paid and are extremely loyal not to the country but to the leader of their battalion.

So to answer your question the regular army is non-compliant and has mostly sided with the people. Remember they are poorly-equipped and so can be of only limited help. However, the battalions belonging to the regime itself are very much in the fight and are killing people wholesale. Still their numbers are not so great to cover this huge country so it seems they are complemented by mercenaries.

This is the strongest statement issued by any government or quasi-government entity, e.g., the UN.  

She believed in nothing; only her skepticism kept her from being an atheist. -- Jean-Paul Sartre